


talk to me (tell me that i’ll be fine)

by orphan_account



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Depression, First Kiss, Fluff, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Suicide Idealisation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:47:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25807597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: He doesn’t realise how long he’s been staring until Alex is looking at him with a concerned expression, asking what’s wrong.“How did you know you were bi?” He fumbles.
Relationships: George Andrew/Alex Elmslie
Comments: 2
Kudos: 82





	talk to me (tell me that i’ll be fine)

**Author's Note:**

> hello yes this is a repost i deleted my previous fic because i got worried about people finding it but it’s all good! thought i might as well put it up again in case anybody wanted to read it because some enjoyed it. i’ll have it on priv for a bit though because apparently alex wants to read fanfics

George knows he’s a human, he has a family and possessions and a body, he needs food and sleep or he’ll die. But he can’t bring himself to feel like one anymore. He’s merely a background character, there to exist, to be whatever the main character wants him to be. He entertains when there’s a camera, doesn’t know what to do when he’s alone. 

Sometimes, when George thinks about it, it feels like he’s had a constant headache since he was a teenager. It’s not so bad anymore, but it’s there, no matter how many attempts he makes to get it to ease away completely.

It’s getting so hard to separate the online personality from his real one—always exaggerating laughter, drawing out jokes. He doesn’t know if it’s because that’s what he feels like he’s supposed to do or if he really has gone insane. Online, it’s almost like a mask; something he can easily throw on to distract himself from his own problems. He’s mastered the ability to fake a smile, bury his emotions like they never existed. It works until it doesn’t.

❧

He lays in bed most days, records videos when he can bare the sound of his own voice. He’s numb, inside out, a shell of who he used to be. The thought used to terrify him at first—the idea of losing who he was, his whole personality, gone—before he forgot what being himself felt like. It pains him to remember himself before adulthood, so innocent, so cheerful. That’s what people tell him he was like, anyway. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t remember. Most of his past feels so blurry and mushed together, with the good parts completely erased, if there were any in the first place.

He feels as though the thought should depress him more than it does.

❧

George wishes he could fucking sleep and feel refreshed the next morning. He wishes that just once, for at least a day he could experience life in a body that’s not miserable and uncared for. Everything about existing hurts—doing anything remotely physical, getting out of bed, sleeping. Everything turns into a job and he doesn’t know how to feel normal again. He wants to feel like a person so badly he could scream. Because this could never go away, George could stay a non-human forever.

That’s not what scares him, though.

George got comfortable where he is, in a way. He hates the bad parts about it, of course he does—the moments of hopelessness and desperation to feel proper emotion, the days of endless fatigue and inability to see the point in anything, the times where he really believes he’s about to fucking kill himself—of course he hates it, he’d be insane if he didn’t.

And there’s no good parts of depression. But the recovering part of it feels like a terrifying concept. George will be different when he comes out of it, surely. He’ll be himself. And George is so, so scared that the real him is the same as this one, or that he’s boring, or that he’ll be someone everyone hates. And if he recovers, there’s the need to keep pushing. Once you go outside you have to do it again and again and again. You have to keep trying and keep any hope that you have so you don’t fall back. And George is too tired. He’s too fucking tired. 

❧

George is eighteen, and the constant headache seems to be the worst it’s ever been. He goes to one of his mate’s parties and drinks until he’s on the verge of blackout. 

He stands in front of a mirror, tries to make sense of his surroundings and himself whilst also fighting a blackout, though he knows he can’t control that. He‘d grabbed, like, a million cups of water earlier in a weak attempt to make himself at least feel sober but now his stomach just hurts. He puts his hands over his face, groans in frustration at his lack of sobriety. 

Someone knocks on the door. George can’t tell if it happened five seconds or five hours ago. When he answers it, he sees a girl. A girl he recognises, he thinks. His girlfriend.

George tries to listen to what she’s saying, he really does, but he can’t focus. His mind feels like complete mush, and his eyes are drifting down to her mouth, trying to lip read because whatever she’s saying right now is gibberish to him. And George can’t keep his fucking mouth shut when he’s drunk. 

“I have something. To tell you.” He slurs out. 

She looks at him, confused, and George can sort of hear what she’s saying again.

“You’re the best. But. But I think I’m fucking gay.”

She leaves, or storms out, George can’t remember. He can’t remember what she said to him after that. He can’t imagine it was good, she blocked his number the next day. George _does_ remember turning around to look in the mirror and throwing up all over himself, though.

❧

He’s diagnosed with depression at the age of nineteen years old.

He thought it’d feel like some sort of amazing discovery, like some life-changing thing that would make him smack his forehead and go _so that’s what’s wrong!_ but he feels the same. There’s no change, no hopefulness or surprise. If anything, it makes him feel that much worse.

❧

George hears the wind whistle softly from outside his window, alongside the sound of cars rushing past. He can’t imagine a world where he isn’t in his room, alone and exhausted. He’s not hopeful enough to imagine a world where in the near future he’s happy and forgets what it was like to feel this way, one where he can be close to his family and make friends. He’s not stupid. 

George either sees his future or he doesn’t. When he does, he’s miserable, with a job he hates, surrounded by people he hates, and dies full of hatred and depression. When he doesn’t, it’s because he thinks he’ll be dead before his life properly begins.

It’s a comforting thought, George thinks. Even if his mind didn’t intend for it to be one. 

❧

When Alex moves in with him, George can’t help but hate and love it at the same time. 

Alex is loud, and he loves to talk about nothing and everything until the early morning. He stays up all night and sleeps all day, but no matter how tired he is he’ll always do a video with George if he asks him to. George likes him, he _really_ likes him, but that’s the problem.

Alex is playing Fifa on the couch at two in the morning, and George is sitting beside him, wide awake and editing a video. Their sleep schedules are so fucked up but George feels like they’re aligned, somehow. 

There’s a question on the tip of his tongue, one that’s been burning there for what feels like years. Every time he feels like asking it his heart stutters and any confidence he had disappears completely.

He doesn’t realise how long he’s been staring until Alex is looking at him with a concerned expression, asking what’s wrong.

“How did you know you were bi?” He fumbles.

Alex stares at him for a second, taken aback. “Um,” he starts, fidgeting under George’s gaze. “I don’t know. I always just knew? I guess? It was always kind of. There. And I knew and I didn’t have much of a problem with it.” 

George wishes shit was that easy.

“Right. Yeah.”

Alex doesn’t ask why he asked, and George is more grateful for that than he’ll ever know.

❧

“We’re going out.”

“What? Why?”

It’s a usual Saturday for George at first. He gets up at 2PM, swallows his meds dry and lays in bed for the next four hours. He thought Alex was in bed too, considering he always is.

“What do you mean _why?_ Mate, we’re going fucking insane. When’s the last time you’ve been outside?”

“I don’t know why you’re suddenly so obsessed with exercise lately,” George mumbles, but he’s already sitting up in bed and putting on a shirt. “You sound like my old therapist.”

“Would me as your new therapist be such a bad thing?”

George looks up to see Alex already grinning down at him. “No,” he grins back. “I guess not.”

❧

George wouldn’t say he’s in _love._

Sure, he likes the way Alex is always there for him, the way he always compliments him on the little things, the way Alex is _Alex._ But he doesn’t like to think about it. It’s not that important.

Why should it be? Why can’t George get it out of his head if it’s so minuscule? Would it be a big deal if he—

He’s _not_ in love.

“Fuck,” George sighs. He rolls over in his bed and tries to go to sleep.

❧

Alex is drinking wine on the couch in front of the TV, watching some show that George has never heard of but he’s sure is probably shit. Because it’s Alex.

“Where’ve you been, then?” He asks, not looking away from the TV.

George sits on the couch beside him, and thinks about what to say.

“Alex.”

“Yeah?”

“Look at me.”

Alex pauses the TV and turns to look at George. “Are you oka—”

“I’m gay.”

There’s a silence for, like, three seconds but it feels like an eternity for George. His throat is drying up and he can’t really breathe and he might cry, or something—

“That’s okay. You knew I wouldn’t mind, right? I’m bi.”

“Yeah—” George’s throat clicks and he looks away to stop himself from crying. “I—I knew. But it was still so fucking hard to say it, y’know? Fuck.”

“Hey, hey...” Alex says, hugging him all of a sudden. “C’mere. It’s okay.”

George cries a little (a lot) more and they don’t talk about it much after. Alex unpauses his stupid show and George can’t stop smiling because he’s so _whipped._

❧

Sometimes George’s meds feel like they’re doing fuck all. Sometimes he’ll stay in bed for days on end and Alex will bring him food that’ll eventually turn cold and be put in the bin. He feels like a robot that wasn’t made correctly.

But even though it’s still there, and George is kind of convinced it always will be, there are these _moments_ so soft or pure or fucking _happy_ that make him feel okay. And he _lives_ for those moments, as short as they can be.

When he gets out of bed after three days Alex is there to greet him, to praise him in a way that isn’t condescending, to make him smile even though he feels like shit.

God, George is fucked.

❧

Alex is making tea in the kitchen, humming to himself all soft and quiet. George comes over and makes sure his presence is known before he ends up scaring Alex.

“Hi,” Alex says, not facing him. “Get any sleep last night?”

“Yeah, could’ve been better. I woke up at 5 in the morning but managed to get back to sleep. What about you?” There’s something so domestic about it that George doesn’t have time to dwell on.

“Oh, y’know,” he says, giving George a cup and drinking from his own. “The usual. I couldn’t sleep _until_ 5 and then I woke up at 6pm.

“Sick,” George laughs, putting his cup on the table. Alex looks at him, curious. There’s a rush of adrenaline, for a moment, and George can’t stop thinking about how much Alex has helped him lately.

“I wanted to say thanks. For, uh, helping me and stuff. I know it probably isn’t easy to watch,” He says, suddenly sheepish, scratching the back of his neck. “But yeah. Thanks.”

Alex doesn’t say anything for a minute. he places his cup next to George’s. “Can I kiss you?”

“What? I mean—yes—I—” George feels like slapping himself in the face. “Yeah.”

And just like that, they’re kissing.

There’s no fireworks or passion, it doesn’t feel like a big moment. It feels like it was bound to happen, it feels like _at last._ It’s a short kiss. It’s done before George’s brain can even register that it happened.

George looks at Alex, and he knows that he can’t fix everything. He knows that. But he’s never felt so hopeful in his life, looking at his face, all smiles and giggles. When he looks at Alex, he doesn’t feel so scared of recovery anymore. 

George thinks he could get used to this.


End file.
